


Come, Tenderness

by anemic_cinema



Series: May Masturbation Challenge [28]
Category: Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Angst, Drabble, F/M, M/M, Masturbation, Unrequited, Violent Thoughts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-28
Updated: 2014-05-28
Packaged: 2018-01-26 21:57:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 351
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1703975
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anemic_cinema/pseuds/anemic_cinema
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Shane sees Rick's tenderness as weakness, but he still wishes he could be the same way.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Come, Tenderness

Shane isn't used to tenderness anymore. He's trying so hard to be hard, to be unaffected, to let go of any vulnerability. All those things make it too easy to collapse and he can't do that. Not when he has to protect Lori and Carl from Rick's weakness. 

It's easy to blame Rick for everything that's gone wrong. If he had kept an eye on Sophia in the woods. If he'd kept Carl closer to him. If he hadn't brought that man back from the town. It goes on. Sometimes Shane thinks that if only Rick had stayed in his coma, or just died, everything would be alright. He tries to stop himself from thinking that though, because when he does, he starts to get ideas.

It would only take him being away from the others, alone with Rick. It would be so easy. 

But that's a line he's not ready to cross yet. He's crossed so many others, but he has to keep himself from losing all of himself in the savagery of these times. But that isn't all of it. He can't cross it because Rick still looks at him like he's his friend, and he's forgiven him for having been with Lori. Like that was even his place to forgive that. 

The fact that Rick can still be tender makes Shane so angry, and so envious. He hates it and wishes he could still afford to be that way. He wishes Rick's tenderness could still make him feel safe, like it used to when they were younger. Those were the days when Shane used to think that there was maybe something between them that could become greater than what they had the ability to conceive. He used to masturbate until he was sore thinking about it. 

He was ashamed of it, but when he was inside of Lori he was happy because he knew it was where Rick had been. It's why he still wants her. It's the next best thing, and it hurts less.

Even now, hunched over it his tent, he strokes himself thinking about it.


End file.
